Basecoat compatibility- attempting to match metallic basecoat

theastronaut

theastronaut

Promoted Users
A friend of mine has a '49 Ford that had stress cracks in the metal near the rear hood brace, and the cracks were poorly repaired when the car was repainted. The cracks came back and got worse, allowing the whole corner to flex which tore and warped that area of the hood. He asked if I'd be willing to cut that corner out and remake it, and repaint the hood so I've been working on it in my spare time. I had to strip the whole hood to bare metal, there were adhesion issues so I'll be repainting the whole hood, not just blending the corner.

He has a tiny amount of the base coat that the car was repainted with, I believe it is Limco. 98% of the label is missing so there was no paint code or mix formula to be found anywhere, and the paint shop that originally mixed the paint has since gone out of business. So he had the hood scanned by another local paint shop to find a match, they mixed a quart of Akzo Nobel Imperium base.

There is only enough of the original base for maybe 1-2 coats so my plan is to shoot the new base for coverage, then shoot the remaining original base for a closer color/metallic match. Not knowing the compatibility of the two bases, I think it would be best to shoot intercoat clear between the Limco and Imperium? Or would I be ok shooting Imperium directly over Limco?
 
No need for the intercoat clear.
Let the base set for 1 hour and match with the limco; no sanding is needed.
 
Barry said:
No need for the intercoat clear.
Let the base set for 1 hour and match with the limco; no sanding is needed.
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Thanks Barry! I'll post the results.

chevman said:
It makes me wonder about the rest of the car.
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It's no show paint job by any means, just a driver. They only cut and buffed the really easy open areas of the panels, the pillar posts and around the window frames are straight out of the gun. A lot of the more difficult to block areas look like they've been hand sanded for adhesion without a block, they're lumpy. Lots of ripples in the bodywork.

I'm wondering how to approach finishing the hood... I did some hammer and dolly work to avoid caking on filler like the last guy did, then filled individual low spots and blocked those but didn't skim it to make it 100% perfect. I'm thinking about just wetsanding the high build (All-U-Need) with a soft block to leave some texture and ripple in the panel to "match" the other panels better. It's already straighter overall than before I stripped it, I don't want it to stick out like crazy against the rest of the car by making it super straight. I'll probably just use a soft pad and 2000 to wetsand the clear so the clear isn't too flat compared to the other panels.

Any pointers on making ripples and replicating poor work on the rest of the car?

This is what I started with- tons of filler, rust under the filler, and areas where the filler or primer didn't stick and was flaking as I stripped it. There were random pimples all over the hood due to corrosion or lack of adhesion.

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"Any pointers on making ripples and replicating poor work on the rest of the car?"

Not a pro, but I have no tips for that
 
Painting and filler work over rust. No good.
Strip it to bare metal, removing all the rust, epoxy primer and work your way back to paint.
I would NEVER try to match substandard work, not even for a close friend. When it fails again, and it will, your name will be all over it.
 
'68 Coronet R/T said:
Painting and filler work over rust. No good.
Strip it to bare metal, removing all the rust, epoxy primer and work your way back to paint.
I would NEVER try to match substandard work, not even for a close friend. When it fails again, and it will, your name will be all over it.
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I'm not replicating poor workmanship, I just don't want it to be 100% straight and look really out of place. I'm thinking that sanding the high build with soft blocks will make it "smooth" while being sanded enough to make the new paint stick, but without making it as straight as my acrylic blocks would. I've already stripped it to bare metal, removed all the rust, and have prepped and primed it using my normal standards. I'm not trying to skimp on quality of prep or quality of materials. Nothing about the way I've prepped it will fail, I just don't want it as straight as my normal work so it matches the rest of the panels more closely. If I block the high build the way I normally would its going to be laser straight.

I know guys that have tons of experience spraying clear and can match various levels of OEM orange peel exactly, and I've matched rusty/faded/patina panels before so that the new panel didn't look out of place or look like it had been repaired. In a similar way I'm wanting to match the rippled panels on the rest of the car. I know its a strange question to ask since all of us here want to do our best on every job we do. I guess my idea of "doing my best" on this job would be to make it look like the hood had never been damaged and the paint looks just like the rest of the paint looks. I'd rather the hood look rippled VS it having a perfect hood mounted against substandard paint everywhere else on the car.
 
theastronaut said:
Any pointers on making ripples and replicating poor work on the rest of the car?
Click to expand...

I didn't word this the best, of course I'm not going to replicate poor prep work that will eventually fail. I just don't want the panels 100% straight.

"How do I get the look of poorly prepped panels?" would be a better way of wording what I'm trying to accomplish.
 
Don’t use your acrylic blocks. I have one of those 3M blocks out of rubber that may be what you’re looking for. Let me know if you need it. May need some dust wiped off. :p



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